


Remember I Love You

by DjDangerLove



Category: 9-1-1: Lone Star (TV 2020)
Genre: But Mostly Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, No Sex, No Smut, Worried Carlos Reyes (9-1-1 Lone Star), soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 19:15:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29051238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DjDangerLove/pseuds/DjDangerLove
Summary: After a rough shift, Carlos takes care of TK by loving him gently.
Relationships: Carlos Reyes/TK Strand
Comments: 20
Kudos: 190





	Remember I Love You

The moon hangs heavy in the Austin sky. Nearly full with only a thin, stray cloud hovering in front of it, its luminance casts Carlos’ bedroom in silver light and deep shadows standing tall in the corners. Stripping down to his boxers and a threadbare police academy t-shirt, Carlos maneuvers around his moonlit bedroom to place his gun in the nightstand and his phone on the charger before easing down to the mattress with more delicacy than he ever has before. 

Rolling onto his side, he meets TK underneath the covers leaving a canyon of space between them that feels impossible to cross. His boyfriend lies pale beneath gray sheets and the pearly radiance of night, the bruises on his face chasing the deep shade of shadows in the room. 

“Okay?” Carlos asks, his voice barely above the sound of the air conditioner kicking on to a soft hum. 

TK blinks once, twice, and keeps them closed as he exhales into the gap between them. “If I say yes,” the words come muffled from where he turns his head into his pillow until a wince has him rolling back to face Carlos again, “does that mean you’re going to stay over there?”

Carlos watches green eyes flutter open to beg him closer and immediately gives in. “I didn’t want to jostle you too much,” he explains, sliding forward until they’re inches apart. “Didn’t want to hurt you.”

“You could never hurt me,” comes on the forefront of a laugh as TK grins against shallow scratches at the corner of his mouth. “Well, you could but I was trying to be romantic.”

Carlos manages to grunt rather than unattractively snort, but puts his amusement on full display by dramatically rolling his eyes. “Call me crazy, but I don’t think the cheesy Hallmark lines are going to do it for me.”

“No?” TK raises an eyebrow, but his face twists in annoying discomfort as it pulls on the butterfly bandages taped there. He pulls his hand out from underneath his pillow and trails his fingers down the length of Carlos’ forearm resting between them. “What is it gonna take then?”

Any other night, Carlos would give in to the chills down his spine, the heat in his belly, the quick pace of his pulse, but none of that comes tonight. Not when the fingers trailing down his skin are covered with medical tape keeping two jammed fingers straight and one long gash covered. 

Shifting so that he can leave his arm there but reach out with his other, he gently curls his hand around TK’s wrist to still his motion. “It’s going to take the peace of mind knowing that you’re really okay. At least tonight.”

“Babe,” TK breathes out and nudges Carlos’ hand until their fingers are intertwined, TK’s taped fingers left on the outside and resting on the mattress. “I’m fine. Only bruises and cuts. Two wonky fingers is the worst of it.”

Carlos rolls forward to press a featherlight kiss against the tape already starting to fray at the ends where TK has undoubtedly been fiddling with it mere hours after having it put on. Glancing up, he runs his eyes down the dark contusions staining light skin wishing he could have washed them away with warm water and gentle fingers like he had the soot and sweat.

“And the rest of it?” he prodded, easing his invasiveness with the slow drag of his thumb across TK’s knuckles. 

“I told you I was good,” TK reminds him, though his eyes track downwards to the slow movement of their fingers as if the disconnect of their gazes could ward off the truth billowing on the back burner of his mind. 

“Yeah, you did say that,” Carlos says on a sigh, remembering for half a second the way his boyfriend had mouthed the words into his neck as they stood under the spray of the shower trying to wash each other’s hurts away despite clinging on to their own. “I don’t think you believe it though. So why should I?”

Months ago, the words would have driven them apart but time had given them the chance to flay each other open with a kind of honesty that would leave them bare to one another for the rest of their lives. 

“Because you worry too much,” TK answers, shifting underneath the covers until their legs bump against each other. “And before you say that dumb pot - kettle thing, when you worry it makes me worry and I-“

“Yes, yes, I know,” Carlos says, “You worry enough for the both of us, but you should know by now I’m not one to be outdone.”

TK jolts, shimmies really with an air of amusement, “Carlos Reyes, are you really so competitive that you’re trying to one up me on worrying?”

Carlos rolls his eyes. “Says the guy that made me stay up until two in the morning one time to practice _foosball / _because he refused lose the tournament Judd had.”__

_  
_“Hey, we won a hundred bucks off that so you’re welcome.”__

___  
_“Oh, thank you so much, darling,” Carlos deadpans. “I don’t know what we would have done if we had lost and just enjoyed a friendly game of foosball.”__  


__

__“Broken up, probably.”_ _

__

__“God!” Carlos cackles at the seriousness to TK’s voice. “I’m never taking you to Vegas.”_ _

__

__“That will make my dad feel better, at least,” TK snickers and squeezes Carlos’ hand. “He’s worried we’ll elope at the marriage kiosk in the airport, I think.”_ _

__

__A silence settles over them for all of a second before Carlos dips his forehead to touch TK’s. “That’s ridiculous,” he nearly whispers. “I’d at least take you to the Elvis Chapel.”_ _

__

__The blush that spreads across TK’s face is visible beneath bruises and moonlight, and he turns his head to hide half of it in the pillow. Carlos commits the sight to memory, silently promising himself that he’ll do anything to be the cause of it again and again for the rest of his life._ _

__

__“I love you,” Carlos says, and even though he’s said it before it feels like he’s said it for the first time. His heart nearly stalls out at the way TK slowly turns his head out from the pillow to peer at him with one eye and the words hang heavy between them like they mean something different. Maybe they do._ _

__“I love you,” he says again before leaning forward and pressing a kiss to TK’s forehead just above the butterfly bandages. “I…I just need you to know that.”_ _

__TK gently shakes Carlos’ hand from his and reaches up to cup his jaw. “I’ve known that for a very long time. I won’t ever forget it.”_ _

__A silence settles over them, thin and warm, and Carlos wishes he didn’t have to break it, but TK’s emotions have a way of settling into echoes hard to get rid of it they aren’t heard._ _

__“Just like I won’t forget you never honestly answered my question from before.”_ _

_  
_TK tangles them together until he’s resting his head on Carlos’ chest and he rubs his hand up and down his side in a lazy pattern of reassurance. “It was a rough shift, I’ll give you that. I was afraid to come to bed tonight, afraid that if I closed my eyes I would just relive it all over again.”_  
_

_  
_Carlos hugs him tighter and kisses the top of his head. “I’m sorry.”_  
_

_  
_“You don’t need to be,” TK kisses the word into his shirt. “I laid here a long time, too numb to move or…I don’t know, I just…but when you came home I didn’t feel anchored to this bed anymore or to all the thoughts running through my head.”_  
_

_  
_“Yeah?”_  
_

_  
_“Yeah.” TK says, letting his hand run up underneath Carlos’ shirt when he drags it up his side. The warm skin of his hand casts a wave of calm through Carlos and he lets it crest over him, lulling him to sleep. He’s nearly there, body lax and mind clear, when TK speaks again._  
_

_  
_“The only thing that scares me more than a call like we had today is you not knowing how much I love you.”_  
_

_  
_Sleep evades him then like loose sand being pulled back with the tide of the ocean and he flips them suddenly, but gently, so that he’s hovering over TK. “There’s no forgetting a love like yours, Tiger. I can promise you that.”__  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! This is my first fic for this fandom so comments are extra appreciated on this one.  
> You can find me on tumblr under the same name if you wanna yell about these two or the show in general. :)


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